The photo was the portrait, home address and home phone number of a newspaper publisher who is ardently pro-gun control. The original post tracks back to someone who appears to be on the political far-right.

Now, I am not anti-2nd Amendment. I've done my share of target-plinking. My husband has hunting rifles and shotguns, and he learned to hunt from his dad, who provides us with venison every deer season. I don't have an issue with people who have revolvers, hunting arms, black powder, or even semi-auto pistols.

I do think there is a strong argument to be made in favor of restricting high-capacity firearms such as the Bushmaster, and armor-piercing ammunition, and closing the gun show loopholes. Anyone who has to go hunting with a 30-round magazine is no hunter. Go shoot skeet instead -- and oh, you only need a shotgun for that.

Both sides have a right to debate the issue. Where I draw the line is when personal information like a portrait photo, phone number and home address gets posted publicly on Facebook by someone with an axe to grind. This is cyber-stalking. It can get people killed.

I did what I could: I reported it to Facebook, made an immediate posting denouncing the tactic, found the employer's Facebook page and sent them an email asking them to warn their employee. I then went back to my page to go delete the individual from my friends list, only to find the individual in question had beaten me to it. Good riddance.

Right now I am as angry as I have been in a very long time. Stalking of any sort makes my blood boil.

It's always been a practice of the far right to go after journalists, and newspaper people that they disagree with, and target them in aggressive and violent ways. Glad you reported it, and I hope action is taken.

acts by cowards that would pee their pants if ever confronted with real fear. On FB all we can do is report and watch. Someone was bullying my grandson, using friends of friends access. Be careful and watch the access.

There is a lot of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) among the gun culture right now. Fear that gun control will go overboard (it won't), uncertainty as to whether parts of their hobby will become unattainable (it may) and doubt about what is going to happen next. Folks like your husband and father in law probably aren't FUDing right now, as most of the gun people I know are not either.

But those who own guns out of fear in the first place, well, they have a head start. They can be dangerous.

Of all the gun people I know (lots) the majority aren't those people. Some are. The latter are folks who I wish could come to realize they are not in so much danger to begin with, but by nature they aren't likely to get to that realization.

We have to keep them from dominating the conversation. As you say, there is plenty of reason and room to have rational conversations. I would like to see the gun show loophole closed once and for all if nothing else, that's not even contentious. Either we have background checks or we don't, no reason having any if anyone can just walk around them.

I can see even concealed-carry in very limited circumstances.
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Prosecutors and their partners, adult family members of FBI, DEA and Justice Dept. lawyers, for example, are often targeted or threatened by the very criminals they pursue. They certainly deserve the right to defend themselves and their loved ones if they so choose. And importantly, I believe that if someone is in a position to need such a permit, that that information should only be released on a need-to-know basis, like to the local police, sheriff's dept and other first responders.

I live in an area with lots of hunters. I just assume that 99.5% of the neighbors have rifles or shotguns. It's part of life out here. But if they're collecting Uzis and the like, that's a totally different matter. I do indeed look askance at anyone other than National Guard or active duty military having any sort of access to that sort of firepower in their home. A lot of people don't realize how far bullets can travel, nor what heavier-caliber bullets can go through -- like the walls of your house and your neighbor's house too.

Assuming that you are going to be able to pull a pistol and defend yourself effectively - in the outrageously unlikely event that such an instance will occur in your life - is poor security planning. Unless you keep yourself in constant training and alter your entire worldview to be on perpetual outlook for some evil actor to come your way (which is an act of realizing all the downsides of a risk without ever being presented with it) you are more likely to shoot yourself in the foot, freeze, or shoot an innocent bystander.

People don't do security analysis well. Perception bias makes us do all sorts of stupid things to address incredibly remote risks while ignoring the ones looming over us.

In my perfect world people have guns for hunting or because they think they are fun and forget the Rambo fantasy of firing six shots and hitting six targets while leaping through the air to their own theme music.

describes me perfectly. My target guns are precisely that -- target guns, that live with trigger locks in their cases in the basement when they're not at the range, because I know damn well I am no action heroine with steely nerves and lightning reflexes.

It's a hobby as absorbing and harmless as any other, so long as one keeps totally in mind what one is doing and the constraints thereof.

If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done subjunctively.

And motorcycles, snowmobiles, climbing things unnecessarily. Modern culture has gotten so outrageously safe that we seek more and more some activity that will present a risk to us that we have to master.

What is fatally flawed in the US gun debate is the idea that guns are necessary to defend against other people, or to overturn the government. But it is right there in black and white (kinda), so it is almost unsolvable.

I have yet to find one of my friends or family who believe they need guns for protection who can point to a time when this actually happened. When having a gun was a useful thing that kept them or their from harm. Instances are sometimes brought up, but none of them to date sound - even to the people recounting them - like a situation where the gun helped. Real experts know that guns are only useful for protection in statistically rare circumstances and then only in the hands of someone who is maintaining a very high level of constant training (and not always then).

The "defense against tyranny" argument similarly has some arguably defensible defenses, but fails when faced with reality. While it is true that tyrannical regimes have historically aimed to take weapons away from the population as part of keeping them under control, there is no analog to modern America that makes any sense. Swords and muskets were fairly equal and easy to manufacture, but an AR-15 isn't going to stop an M1A1 tank no matter how survivalist you get.

We have replaced the lawlessness of ancient times with laws and a peaceful society and reduced personal risk to levels below what our ancestors could conceive of. We have developed systems of governance which allow the population to topple the US government without resorting to force.

I think strict parameters for concealed carry would also suggest that this information would be on a need-to-know basis. And yes, it was a foolish, and possibly dangerous, thing to do. That said, two wrongs do not make something right. Tit-for-tat gets people hurt.